Today’s Parola del Giorno is the noun expression i voli pindarici, which means flights of fancy. The expression is derived from the ancient Greek author, Pindar, whose poems often jump from one argument to the next!

Sometimes it is really difficult to follow my history professor’s lessons: he takes many flights of fancy, first he will talk about Ancient Greece and a second later will talk about Napoleon. He confuses us students.

In the museum dedicated to the 18th-century we visited last month, there was an exhibition on carriages nobles of the period used to use to move about the city or head out to the countryside. Some were so full of comforts that they seemed similar to today’s automobiles!

Today’s Parola del Giorno is the noun, la berlina, which means sedan (or saloon in British English), a type of car usually for four to five people. The number of doors and seat configuration is dependent on the manufacturer although they typically have four doors and/or a hatchback.

Guys, did you know Maria sold the station wagon she had for fifteen years and bought a new sedan? It is spacious, very elegant, dark blue, inside there are all the comforts and it doesn’t use a lot of gas like the station wagon. I would like a car like that, too!

Update:
Hi everyone, I just wanted to give an update. First, I have had to deal with some family issues that have been huge demands on my time, so I have not been able to dedicate myself to the web site the last couple of months. Things appear to be improving on that front so I hope to be able to dedicate more time to Parola del Giorno. Second, I participated in my first academic conference this summer and that also required a considerable amount of time and attention.

Thanks for all your patience as I work through professional and personal demands.

Also, volume 3 of Le piccole guide is ready! I need to do one more small set of corrections and edits, and I will release it shortly. Volume 4 is also in the works and will be a vocabulary builder. One of the criticisms that I often received when learning Italian was that I didn’t know how to describe things beyond interessante or bello so I hope that this little guide will help to improve your arsenal of adjectives and descriptors! 🙂